


Interlude 2: What Happened in Bahrain wasn't meant to stay in Bahrain

by Celticas



Series: Hidden Valkyrie [4]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Bahrain, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-31
Updated: 2019-02-22
Packaged: 2019-10-19 22:21:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 7,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17610104
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Celticas/pseuds/Celticas
Summary: Skye remembers Bahrain a little differently then May, and its time the other woman learnt the truth.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Isthatawalrus](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Isthatawalrus/gifts).



> Unlike the last story, I'm going to be posting this fortnightly. I got a little stuck on the third chapter and want to give myself the time to get it right. If I'm able to get it done, Ill go back to weekly but I can't promise that.  
> I do have the next episode already fully written though, so it will be back to weekly then.

“You know we have links into some of SHIELD’s systems. One of the ones I keep a close eye on is the Potential Index Candidates list. Eva Belyakov had been on it with no leads to where she was since she first got on your radar in 1992.” Skye started her story with things May already knew. They returned to the pilot’s seats and avoided eye contact, each choosing a star to focus on.

“In October 2008 she pinged my facial-rec in Al Wakrah, Qatar.” Skye moved into the part of the story May didn’t know. Falling into a rhythm of half story half briefing….

Skye and Violet were enjoying a late breakfast. Skye had been up all-night tracking James on satellites she had appropriated from various international governments. For the last three months James had been trekking along the board of Iran and Afghanistan, and Pakistan and Afghanistan. There had been a slow funnelling of money out of known Hydra accounts, and following the money they had found a build-up of weapon stashes throughout the region. They didn’t yet know who was selling nor who was buying. The area didn’t hold any value to Hydra so why were they funding the activity?

The hacker was exhausted. Violet had physically dragged the smaller women out of their shitty 5-storey walk up in Hell’s Kitchen. It was a sweltering two blocks to their favourite diner, but the moment they walked through the door they were ushered into a booth with coffee thrust into their greedy hands. They might be there a little too often.

Without bothering to take an order the waitress brought them both plates heaping with steaming hot breakfast foods, eggs, bacon, fried tomatoes and more. Skye moaned at the smell, in her opinion it was the perfect ratio of grease, heat, and vegetable matter. They fell upon the food quietly; the only sounds were the clatter of cutlery and the dull thump of thick ceramic on laminated wood.

Harsh electronic beeping broke the rhythm of hunger. Skye jumped at the sound coming from her pocket.   The two short beeps followed by one long beep was the unique alarm she had set for the program constantly trolling for the people on SHIELD’s potential Index list. There were never more than a handful or two of names on that list, SHIELD was good at getting to them quickly.

Skye’s hand slithering into and out of her pocket in a flash. Her phone looked like it was a few years out of date Hammer cell, the metal case scratched and dented. Inside it was anything but. She had completely gutted and retro-fitted her own tech into the case, allowing her to hide in plain sight.

The screen had a picture and link to the file of the potential.

“Eva Belyakov.” She read, scrolling though the file.

Violet waved Sarah, their waitress, over and pulled out her purse. Breakfast was over.

“Came onto SHIELD’s radar more than a decade ago.” Skye whistled, impressed. If someone was stupid enough to get themselves on that list, they normally didn’t have the skills to dodge SHIELD for longer than a few months, a year at the most. To last 10 years took serious knowledge or help and suggested the initial radar ping was a major blunder on the potential’s part.

“Facial has her in Al Wakrah, Qatar of all places.” Skye was so intent on the phone she tripped over her own feet getting out the door.

Violet sighed, even as her hand shot out and grabbed the younger woman’s elbow. Skye smiled at her sheepishly in thanks.

“Sorry.” She mumbled.

“Let’s just get home and then you can fill me in.” Violet said, turning them both in the direction they needed.

Walking though the front door, they took off their shoes, Skye toeing her beaten converse off while Violet took the time to properly untie her laces. Skye had her main computer system up and displaying a photo of a blonde woman in her 30s by the time Violet made her way out of the small entry way.

“Eva?” Violet guessed.

“Yep. It’s a couple years old though. An FSB agent saw her get hit by a car. The car was totalled, and she walked away without a scratch. FSB flagged her, which then flagged SHIELD. They have both been looking ever since.” Skye summarised what the agencies knew.

Violet read the longer version over Skye’s shoulder. “Any indication as to how she got her powers?”

“Nope. Pretty normal work history in Ufa until mid-1996 when there is a six-month gap, no tax filings, no correspondence and Russia tracks that shit pretty well. No evidence that she left the country, but nothing to suggest she was still there either.” Skye looked at what her own programs had been compiling about the woman. “Early 1997 she was back in Ufa, picked up where she left off until 1998 when she had the intimate meeting with a car. Disappeared again. I haven’t found anything from this century.” Skye pushed her rolling chair away from the beaten 5-th hand desk that had half a phone book under one leg to stabilise it. As she rolled, she twisted to face her friend. “That’s all she wrote.”

A grin spread across Violet’s face. “Guess we’re heading to Qatar then.” She headed out of the room to grab her go-bag. “Does SHEILD know yet?” She asked over her shoulder.

Skye turned back to her computers and looked at the logs. “No.” She shouted into the other room. Her own go-bag was at the end of the couch she slept on when it was a full house. Violet and James had the proper bedrooms unless one of them wasn’t there, in which case Skye got a proper bed. Though with her and James moving towards something more that might start changing. They had been out on two coffee dates before the dodgy money transactions had started showing up. He had asked her to dinner for once he got back. Skye smiled to herself before getting out of her chair and grabbing her bag, meeting Violet back at the door.

The whole trip home had taken no more than 10 minutes. In another 10 they were in a car and heading out of the city. All up it was just over an hour after the alert sounded when they were lifting off in their stolen, untraceable quinjet. They only had the one and it had been decided that it was too conspicuous for James to take into an area that was crawling with black-ops, intelligence, normal military, para-military, NGOs, journalists, and more than one terrorist organisation.

= + =

It was just after midnight in Qatar when the quinjet landed on the roof of an empty building on the outskirts of the coastal city. The only indication of its presence was a stirring of the yellow desert dust that coated the roof and the whirr of the engines that no one was close enough to hear. Skye slipped out the back of the jet to set up a grid of cameras and motion sensors, anything bigger than a pigeon would ping her phone. Nothing was going to get close to their transport. Not to sabotage it, nor steal it.

They had scanned the building before landing, looking for heat signature, but Skye still checked each room to make sure it wasn’t being used by the either the city’s underworld, or its homeless. Everything suggested the building was truly abandoned. Once finished she ghosted out the back door to find Violet waiting with their bags, a headscarf already wrapped around her hair and another one held ready for Skye.

Appropriately dressed, they shouldered their bags and sticking to the shadows, worked their way further into the city. It had taken Skye over an hour to find a hotel that had a spare room, it was the first night of Eid and the city was at capacity. The clock had ticked past one in the morning by the time they had made their way on foot to their cramped hotel room, collected their keys, and deposited their bags.

“She was spotted on a facebook photo that was tagged at the Souk. Start there?” Skye asked Violet as they meandered down the main street of the small city, weaving in and out of the crowds that still filled the streets.

“It’s a good a place to start as any, she had a good lead on us.” They took the next left, dodging around a large family exiting one of the many pop-up restaurants.

The Souk was easy to find, it was a riot of people, and colour, and sound, and smell. Even at the late, or early, hour it still blazed with light. A golden patch of light and movement in a city in celebration. Violet stopped at the first stall that wasn’t bursting with people and waved the owner over.

"Kul 'am wa enta bi-khair." She spoke slightly louder than normal to be heard over the roar of so many people. Her long time on earth and Allspeak allowing her to speak with the man.

Arabic wasn’t one of the languages that Skye knew, so she hung back, keeping an eye on the crowd for people taking too much of an interest in the two strange women out on their own, and for Eva. Not that anything had ever been that easy.

Behind her Violet and the man finished speaking. Catching Skye’s eye, Violet shook her head and they moved on. Violet was telling people they were looking for her sister, Violet looking enough like Eva, ie blonde and European, that it was believable. For an hour and a half this pattern held. No one recognised her, no one remembered seeing her, no one knew anything.

Their luck changed at a spice seller on the opposite end of the market then they had entered. Frantic nodding and pointing from the man pulled Skye’s attention away from the crowds that had thinned significantly, only those intent on making the absolute most of the holiday were still out.

“Kanat huna 'ams mae abnatiha. Tus'al ean almudun 'iilaa alghurb.” The words meant nothing to Skye, but Violet was nodding along.

“Hal qalat ‘ayu qaryatan? Min almhmi jiddaan ‘ajadaha.” Violet responded.

The man nodded and said. “Ash-Shahaniyah.”

“Shukraan lakum.” Violet thanked the man and bought some star anise, handing him much more than it was worth and waving off the change. A payment for the help without outright buying it.

“She is heading to Ash-Shahaniyah. He said she has her daughter with her.” Violet explained as they left the Souk.

The city was much quieter than when they had set out.

“Daughter? I didn’t find anything on a kid.” Skye paused to think it through but decided the new information would change their need to catch up with Eva, she would just add it to the search parameters. “We going by car or jet?” Skye asked.

They were half way back to the hotel before Violet answered, taking the time to work through the options. “Jet to Ash-Shahaniyah. Try and make up some time.”

The rest of the trip was in silence. Back at the hotel they showered, changed, and ate a quick breakfast before checking out less than six hours after checking in.

= + =

They set down outside the small city just as the sun was rising. They had to circle twice before they could find somewhere clear of the large-scale construction happening around most of the perimeter. Eventually they set down a mile into the desert, they couldn’t see any tracks from people, vehicles, or camels. Unlike in Al Wakrah they had no place to start looking here, a largely industrial city with no idea where Eva was going or why she was here.

Once landed, Skye settled in front of the small computer set up in the back of the ‘jet. Having a smaller area to look, she hooked into the city’s cameras and social media, although there weren’t many of the second. It was the matter of only a few minutes work to refine the facial recognition program with an emphasis on the roads in and out, and the few hotels. It wasn’t much but it was something.

With as much done as possible before the sun was a bit further up, the two women pulled out an inflatable camping mattress each and lay down to try and sleep.

Insistent beeping woke them up. Groaning, Skye fought her way out of her blankets and stumbled to her computers. Wiggling the mouse woke the screens back up and the inky blackness of technology at rest gave way to a photo captured from CCTV of a white woman in profile outside of car rental with a small lump that could be a child plastered to her side. It was grainy from movement and early morning shadows, but how many Caucasian women could there be in Ash-Shahaniyah?

“Vi.” Skye called to wake the other woman. She had learnt over time that the Asgardian could sleep through any electronic noise.

The blonde grunted in reply.

“I might have her.” Skye said, even as she started hacking into the shop to pull their records. It was quick work to find the paperwork on the system showing that Eva had been returning a car. The contact number listed was fake, and the home address was for a home cleaning service in Volgograd. The paperwork was a dead end. But the CCTV footage gave a time and location to start searching out from. Skye set Freya onto the task and put some food on and settled down to wait. She pulled her phone from her pocket and stared at its black screen before finally snorting at her own behaviour and shooting off a quick text to James. Just to make sure he was ok and let him know where they were up to.

The smell of toaster waffles was finally enough to drag Violet, rumpled from her blankets, scowl firmly in place. She could switch from dead asleep to battle ready in 1.34 seconds when needed, otherwise it took her two cups of coffee (three if it was James and his depression era approach to cooking) and carbohydrates to fully wake up.

A waffle stuffed in her mouth, another in one hand, and a cup of coffee in the other, she was finally cognizant enough to wave the mug in the direct of the computers asking for an update.

Skye smiled at her friend and filled her in with the little she had uncovered. “…From the rental place she continued West. I have her and a small person, maybe the daughter, meeting with another woman, a local, and leaving town along Dukhan Highway in a beat-up grey sedan. I have the programs looking for any images along the road, particularly where it goes through Al Uwaynah but nothing yet. I think they stopped somewhere along the highway.”

“Any sign of SHIELD?” Violet asked, having finished grappling with an overfull mouth.

“Nope.” Skye popped the word, they had a significant lead on the spy organisation.

“Let’s find that car then.” Violet pushed away from the wall she had been lounging against and ducked into the cockpit.

A large dust cloud engulfed them as they took off, desert sands were not made for stealth. The highway was easy to pick out, a straight, flat, bone white line drawn through the rolling dunes. Halfway between Ash-Shahaniyah and Al Uwaynah, Violet spotted the sedan. It was sitting abandoned ten meters off the road. Its doors closed and locked. There were no signs of a struggle or abduction. The women and child they were looking for hadn’t been dragged from the car, they had left it willingly. Hovering over it Violet pointed at something in the sand.

“There. Footprints.”

They followed the tracks further into the desert. Flying low the early morning sun on their left. Coming over a tall dune, palm tree lined oasis was a patch of green in the otherwise barren landscape. Off to one side a group of tents huddled together, squat, textile houses. The trail they had been following lead right to it. Without needing to speak, they agreed to settle the ‘jet on the other side of the clearing and approach on foot.

The sun was fiercely bright as they walked through the oasis, the only scant protection from its glare was within the palm tree which they quickly left behind.

Something was wrong.

Nobody moved within the settlement. The wind plucking at textiles and racing through palm fronds, the only sound.

“Marhabaan.” Violet called out in greeting.

There was a rustling within one of the further tents. Hushed voices that were quickly muffled. Skye and Violet headed for the sound.

Together they pushed through the door covering, into a white fog that instantly had them both coughing.

Skye tried to take a step backwards, away from the already clearing gas, but couldn’t. It felt like her feet had been covered in concrete, she looked down and saw a dark rock _growing_ up her legs. It quickly reached her hips. A weight grew on her fingers, her hands, her arms. She raised them in front of her face. Watching horrified as she was encased. She looked over at Violet, who was still coughing violently but was otherwise fine.

“Vi…?” Was all she got out before her face was covered.

She couldn’t move.

She couldn’t see.

She couldn’t _breathe._


	2. Part 2

Deep within herself something shook. Just as the rock had grown up, the shaking grew out. Pushing against the stone that contained her.

One crack appeared.

Then another.

Suddenly, it shattered.  Small pieces of the stone were peppering the tent walls. Freed from what could have been her tomb, Skye gasped for breath. Small shafts of sunlight lit up the inside of the previously shrouded tent through a multitude of tears in the canvas.

Eva and her daughter were standing at the other end of the tent. Eva unaffected, like Skye her daughter was also in a cracking stone _cacoon_ the word came to her. At her side Violet was bent in half, still coughing, whatever that fog had been it was seriously affecting the Asgardian.

“The fuck was that?” Skye took a step forward, anger written in every line of her body. The floor tilted, and then rolled under her feet. She had spent some time in Southern California and recognised the beginning trembles of an earthquake.

After the first wave, the ground under Skye's feet stabilized. A six-foot-wide circle of earth around her was still, outside of that the earthquake was intensifying. Growing waves of movement rippled out from Skye, the epicenter of whatever the hell was happening. Cracks were pulled open as the quakes continued.

Violet finally got the cough under control, but unstable, had been thrown to her knees.

Eva was hugging her child close to her, trying to keep them both upright. The girl, still shedding her stone, was screaming.

"Skye! Skye, you need to stop!" Violet was yelling, trying to climb to her feet on the uneven ground.

"I'm not doing anything." She cried, terrified. A small voice in the very back of her mind said she was.

"I think you are. You need to calm down." Violet stumbled, only keeping herself from falling on her ass by grabbing the side of a low table. She pulled herself up again and got within the stable circle around the younger, frightened woman.

Skye gasped in a single, stuttering, breath. The dust being thrown up by the disturbance tried to choke her. The next inhale was slightly smoother, as was the next. As each breath came in easier, the trembling lessened.

Violet came up to her side and placed a hand low on her back. "That’s good. You can do this."

The quaking finally stopped, rolling to stillness.

Skye looked up and took in the destruction. Half of the tent's walls had come loose and were waving softly in the breeze, the tall lantern holders that had been spread around the perimeter of the tent had toppled, spot fires started where the candles had fallen.

In the time it had taken for Skye to regain some level of control, Eva and her daughter had snuck away.

"We have to go after them." Skye made to leave via the other pairs most likely exit.

"Skye, stop." Violet grabbed her arm and gently pulled her to a stop. "We need to figure out what happened."

"Where would we even look?" Skye shouted, her hysteria beginning to rise. "What would we do? Post a Yahoo answers 'Power giving fog, ideas?'" the final word broke with fear. At the first roll of the earth, she forced herself to concentrate on her breathing again. Trying to stop the tremors before it began.

"Eva knows what that was, we find her we find answers." Skye almost plead. Lightly trying to pull her arm free, no strength behind it.

Violet bit her lip in thought, then gave a determined nod. “Okay, but we take the 'jet, it's faster."

With a decision made they raced out of the half-downed tent, through the rest of the settlement, past the palm trees, jumping over the fallen fronds as they went. The radius of Skye's earthquake reached all the way to the 'jet, which was listing to one side where the sand had shifted.

For the next two hours they spiralled a wider and wider path out from the oasis. No sign pointing to where Eva and her daughter had gone…

“We didn’t catch up to them again until Bahrain.” It was close to midnight when Skye finished telling the half of the story that May hadn’t been there for. “We figured that Eva’s daughter, Katya, had gotten powers too. But Bahrain was a cluster fuck from start to finish, and not just for you or SHIELD.”

Skye kept her eyes on the long empty mug in her hands that she was slowly turning, keeping part of her mind on the vibrations of the ceramic which allowed her to tell this story. Tell someone who hadn’t been completely vetted, the story of a time that irreversibly and almost catastrophically changed her life.

“And in Bahrain?” May spoke for the first time in hours.

“We had managed to pick up their trail in Dukhan, but they were already gone. A truck driver who had given them a ride put them in touch with a fisherman. They convinced him, or I guess Katya did, to smuggle them into Bahrain. Katya’s manipulation wore off without reapplication, so we were able to track them down but each time we got too close the people who knew anything were still being controlled and couldn’t tell us. Worst game of cat and mouse ever.” Skye fake pouted. “We arrived in Manama three days ahead of you…

As with everywhere else they had been in the last month Manama was sun bleached and bustling. They had had to leave the ‘jet in southern Bahrain and wind their way through the country in a succession of cars, buses, trains and boats as they tracked Eva and Katya.

The underworld was beginning to swirl with whispers and hints of the normal movement of people being disrupted. Something big had shifted in Bahrain. Back in a city, it was easier to keep track of a blonde woman traveling alone with her daughter. Before the only people who had seen them were being controlled by them, now shopkeepers and taxi drivers had interacted with them but were not of enough use to control.

Each day they got closer.

They caught their first sight of them three days after arriving in Manama.

They were talking to a cloth seller, well Violet was, when Skye saw a flash of blonde hair out of the corner of her eye. Twisting to look in that direction, Skye caught Eva’s eye. The other woman’s light blue eyes widened in shock and recognition.

“Katya, priyti.” She grabbed her daughter’s arm and tried to slip behind and away, between two local women in long flowing burqa.

“Violet.” Skye called as she jumped into action. Racing after Eva. She wove between the two women Eva had slipped away between. “Eva, wait! We want to help.”

The look Eva shot in Skye’s direction was pure fear. “SHIELD never wants to help.” Eva’s accent was a thick layer over her word, making it almost impossible to understand around the hubbub of the market.

“We aren’t SHIELD! I promise!” Skye tried to edge closer, weary of what the other woman would do. She could feel a presence behind her, the high bright humming of Violet’s vibrations that she had become so familiar with over the last few months.

“Then who are you?” Eva snarled, for the last decade she had had to run and hide, even her own people would no longer support her. Who was this woman to chase her and Katya and promise help were there was none?

“My name is Violet and this is Skye.” Violet introduced them as she joined Skye, shoulder to shoulder. “We know what SHIELD does to people like you, people who can do extraordinary things. We have the resources to help keep you hidden.”

As Violet talked, Eva began to relax to slightest amount. Her shoulders dropped and the exhaustion she had been hiding slipped past her mask.

“Why?” She asked, her voice tinged with sadness. “Why help us?”

“Because no one deserves to be hunted.” Violet was slowly closing the distance between them as they talked.

Eva’s eyes had been flicking everywhere, evaluating the people flowing around them for threats, as they talked. Something over Skye’s left shoulder caught her attention, the tension returning to her slight frame even as she began edging backwards. The trust falling from her eyes.

“You lie! You are SHIELD!” Eva grabbed Katya’s hand and in seconds they were running again.

“What? No. Wait.” Skye lunged forward. The little control she had gathered over her powers slipping in her desperation not to lose them again and the ground rocked beneath them.

Skye kept her feet, they had found the she was either completely unaffected by her vibrations or that her body was automatically compensating for the movements.

Beside her Violet staggered for a second. Finding her footing quickly she latched a hand around Skye’s bicep. “Stop! This isn’t helping.”

Skye blinked. Not comprehending the words for a long second. She sucked in a deep breath, closed her eyes and re-asserted her grip on her powers.

Eva and Katya took the opportunity to run. Their attempts to move through the chaos weren’t successful. Violet sprung after them, while Skye twisted to try and figure out what had spooked Eva, for a minute there it had seemed as if the other woman was willing to trust them.

Among the long flowing robes and dark skin of the locals, the two people in black business suits stood out. It was a man and a woman, the man was facing away from them, on guard against something, while the woman was facing the marketplace. Her face was familiar.

“Shit.” Skye swore, and ran after Violet. Dodging between people still picking themselves and their stalls up, she was able to catch up just as Violet stepped from the dry sunlight of the market into the dust half-light of a decrepit apartment building. “SHIELD is here. I saw Melinda Ma, Nat’s friend.” Skye puffed out, trying to catch her breath as they slowed.

Violet nodded in understanding. There wasn’t much she could do about the presence of SHIELD now. All they could try and do was keep Eva and Katya away from them. The two women continued through the building. The dust covered floors and creaky doors made it hard to remain undetected and they soon stopped trying. They had worked their way through three empty apartments, the building unnaturally still around them. The thump of a body against a sandstone wall disturbed the silence. They crept towards the sound. A cry of pain had them drawing a weapon each, Violet a blade and Skye a pistol. A gun shot had them running. The stairwell they emerged into was filled with movement.

Melinda May was in the middle of the chaos. Blood stained the floor beneath her. A local man was on the floor, unseeing eyes staring at a blank wall in death. A second man was still up and fighting. The gun that had been his only advantage knocked out of his hand and into a corner. There was too much movement for Violet or Skye to help the SHIELD agent.

“I want your pain.” The man growled at Melinda, before launching himself at her. It was a fool’s errand.

Melinda bent out of the line of attack and brought a hand down on the back of his neck, as he rocketed past. The blow sent him to his knees. Stunned. With a tight grip on his chin and the back of his neck, Melinda wrenched. The crack of the man’s neck breaking echoed between the close walls.

The building settled back down, movement slowing and then stopping. Melinda stood in the middle of the death she had wrought and gasped for breath, blood trickling from a hundred small wounds and one major one.

“Who..” She started to ask as she turned and saw Violet and Skye in the doorway with weapons drawn.

“STOP.” The command came out of nowhere. The command came from above them.

The three women looked up. On the landing above them three people stood. They were an odd collection. The woman standing pressed against the balustrade was a young Chinese woman, her face sundered by a multitude of old scars. Behind her left shoulder another woman stood, older than the first, with eyes that were ice chips in a coldly beautiful face. The only man stood behind the right shoulder of the first woman. He was the oddest of the group. His face was tilted down towards them, but where eyes would normally be a wide band of flesh sat instead.

“Sleep.” The blonde woman said, power behind the word.

May staggered and fell, her eyes slipping shut. Violet jumped forward to catch her. An arm around her waist slowed the agent’s descent. She was asleep by the time Violet had fully lowered her to the floor. Skye felt the pull of the command, her body trying to succumb, while her mind fought to stay awake. Staggering backwards a step, the only thing that kept her on her feet was her shoulder connecting with the wall.

“Skye!” Violet’s voice echoed oddly in Skye’s ear, the first part of her name was blurred, the second was sharp enough to cut through the fog that was succeeding in pulling her under.

A hand landed on her shoulder, twisting her around and away from the support of the wall. She stumbled. The crack and sudden, stinging pain of the slap shocked her brain free. The room around them came into stark focus. The crumpled form of Agent May on the floor and the lack of a group looking down on them.

“Where?” Skye scrubbed a hand over her face. “What?”

“They didn’t wait to see if we went down. I don’t know.” Violet answered both questions in quick succession, a frown showing her displeasure at not knowing what had just occurred.


	3. Part 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all,  
> I'm going to continue posting this on a bi-weekly basis, off setting it with chapters of Operation: Harmony (Hopefully, if I run out of Op:H chapters I'll go back to a weekly posting schedule here).  
> Enjoy!

After checking to make sure the downed agent would be ok, they carefully cleared the resot of the apartment block. Moving from one room to another, weapons at the ready. Once finished in that building, they continued onto the warehouse that was joined to the residential building by an enclosed walkway.

The sound of crackling electricity was the next sign of life they found. Violet pulled Skye to a stop.

“Listen.”

Violet’s senses were more finely tuned than any human Skye had ever met, supers included. But since the gassing in the desert, Skye had developed a new sense. The movement of energy or matter or _something_ tingled across her skin and sang through her blood. She could read someone emotions from two rooms away when she focused, and she didn’t just hear sounds any more, now she felt them as an echo in her brain of something half remembered.

“What is that?” Skye asked, pausing beside her friend.

The dust filled sunlight slanted through windows high on the walls, cutting squares of burnished gold out of the half-light of the large room. From their shadowed doorway, they couldn’t see far into the space, stacks of wooden crates sheltered one side of the room from their sight.

“I WILL HAVE YOUR PAIN!” Eva’s cry bounced off the boxes and walls, creating a chorus of distress.

“Eva please…” It was the woman who had first spoken in the stairwell, whatever she was going to say was cut off. A heavy exhalation of air and a heavy object impacting with one of the crates exploding in the unseen section. Even before the sharp clatter of wood splinters hitting the cement had registered in Skye’s mind, the two women were running. Weaving their way through the stacked crates.

Turning the final corner, the scene opened up. Eva was standing in the middle of the space, defiant, blood streaking one side of her face. Across from her the Asian woman was just shifting herself out of the wreckage of a splintered crate, softly groaning.

Concentrating, Skye was able to send all of them flying, along with every crate, table, and chair on that side of the cavernous room. She could put a lot of energy behind her newly acquired power, but not a lot of accuracy. The impact with the far wall knocked the three new comers silly, Eva was shaken but ok, and Katya was nowhere to be seen.

Having gained a few seconds of breathing space, Skye and Violet advanced on the downed people. Skye broke off to cover Eva with her pistol, she was the known quantity, while Violet took the unknown trio.   

“Who are you?” Violet asked.

The Asian woman glowered from her position crumpled against the wall.

“Ask your friend, she is one of us after all.” The man said, an unattractive sneer on his face even as his eyeless sight were trained on Skye.

“That doesn’t tell us anything.” Skye grumbled.

Violet narrowed her eyes in Skye’s direction, a silent ‘shut up’.

“Who we are isn’t any of your concern. We are here to deal with our own.” The woman pushed herself up and away from the wall.

In time with her movements, Violet shifter the tip of her blade, keeping it millimetres from the other woman’s exposed flesh.

“Your blade doesn’t scare me.” The two women glared at each other down the length of the razor-sharp edge.

“I want your pain.” The flat voice came from a different door way than the one Skye and Violet had entered.

The shuffling entrance of a tired looking local man broke the stale mate. Skye swung the barrel of her pistol around, training it on the new comer who was quickly joined by two more men. As they shuffled into the light, their western looks and identical suits identified them as SHIELD agents. She stumbled back one step, and then another as they advanced into the room, undeterred by the cold dark opening of the weapon pointed at them. Their hands lifted in entreaty. There was no humanity in their faces, no life behind their lightless eyes.

In tandem they spoke, “I need your pain.” They offered a way out of the struggle of living in the harshness of the world. Give over control and you never need to feel pain again.

Their flat voices were joined by the higher but just as dull voice of Eva.

In the first moments of shock at the men’s arrival, she hadn’t heard nor _felt_ them coming, she had taken her eyes off Eva. Pushing herself off the floor with one hand even as the other stretched out towards Skye, she had spoken in perfect time with the men.

Skye was too slow. Even as she twisted to try and get the other woman back in her sight lines, Eva managed to get a hold of her. The cold hand landing on her skin startled Skye, by reflex she pulled the trigger.

The shot echoed through the room.

Five people held their breath.

Three people exhaled in pleasure.

One person gasped.

“I need your pain.” The three men spoke again, greed, and hunger, and lust twining through the words.

Eva staggered back until she hit the wall.

“SKYE!” Violet shouted.

“Oh my god.” Skye breathed.

“Eva!” The woman who had been squaring off against Violet called.

The cacophony of sound was stunning in the aftermath of the long moment of silence.

Red blossoming across the dirty white of Eva’s shirt. The hand she had used to reach out to Skye, pressed against the wound in her chest and came away wet and tacky with blood. She looked at it as if confused by the colour. She tried to draw breath to speak, she coughed, and then coughed again, blood speckling her lips as she struggled to pull in breath.

“Oh god.” Skye stumbled backwards, shaking from adrenalin and shock. She couldn’t look away from Eva as the woman doubled over, only kept upright by the wall at her back.

“Eva.” The sightless man whispered as he hurried over to the injured woman. Dropping to his knees he gently cradled the woman in his arms.

“Gordon.” The word crack across the space. A command and a warning hidden in the name.

“No. Not this time Jiaying.” He answered. He pulled Eva against his chest, one of her arms around his shoulders, and stood. He was upright for only a second before plunging towards the earth again. His hand slapped the dirt floor, and forks of blue edged lightning arced out of his back and into the ground, enveloping the two. Skye flinched away from the light.

The spots from the sudden brightness in the otherwise gloomy warehouse took Skye precious seconds to recover from. When the room came back into focus, Eva and the man were nowhere to be seen. There were no footprints, nor blood spots leading away from the pool that had been grown beneath them before they disappeared.

“ **Kào běi.” The newly identified Jiaying swore at the emptier room.**

A giggle came from the doorway. It was the light sound of a child at play in a situation that no child would find fun. “I like the pain.” Katya stepped out of the shadows. Her face was contorted with a smile that had a sickening twist too it. As she drew level with the first of the SHIELD agents, she flicked a hand at him and he crumpled without a sound.

She continued forward.

“You killed mother.”

Another flicked wrist.

Another body.

“And there was so much pain.”

A final hand movement.

A final body meeting the floor.

“I like all their pain.” Katya continued forward. She closed the distance between herself and Skye. “I’m scared.” Her face crumpled as she was almost within touching distance of Skye. “I want to leave.” A tear worked its way down her cheek.

“SKYE!” Violet called from behind them. “Get away from her!”

Her friend’s voice broke the hold that Katya seemed to have over Skye, who took first one and then another careful step backwards. She didn’t want to take her eyes off the girl.

“Katya, stop.” Jiaying said as she stepped forward.

The little girl’s attention turned from Skye to Jiaying.

“Please give me your pain.” She held out her hand.

With the attention off her, Skye was able to retreat to Violet’s side. Together they watched as Jiaying took Katya’s hand.

Both woman and child froze.

Slowly at first and them with more speed, the colour drained from Katya’s skin. First her lips turned blue, then the life fled from her eyes before they fluttered shut. Her nails, and then her fingers, and then her hands turned grey.

As they watched the life seeped from her. A final sigh of breath, of release slipped from between her white lips. Then like the men she had stolen from, she toppled. Jiaying’s hand in her’s the only thing stopping her from hitting the ground hard.

“What did you do?” Violet demanded, racing forward. She dropped to her knees, still running, and slid the last few feet to stop beside Katya.

Gentle fingers searched for a pulse, when they didn’t find one the Asgardian Warrior was on her feet, weapon drawn and slicing into the skin of Jiaying’s upper arm before the other woman could react. At the first bite of steel into flesh, Jaiying twisted out of the way, just managing to save her arm from more than a deep cut.

Violet followed the movement, the tip of her blade reconnecting with flesh and bone along a hip that didn’t move out of the way fast enough.

Bleeding from the two cuts, Jiaying was able to latch a hand onto Violet’s weapon-less wrist. The skin around the contact began to grey, colour and life being drawn from one woman into the other.

“That trick won’t work on me.” Violet snarled. A single moment of concentration had the colour returning to its proper place. With balance restored, she twisted her wrist and broke the hold. She stepped out of easy arm’s reach, no need to go through that again, and brought her blade up between them.

Gordon’s blue lightening lit up the room like a prolonged camera flash. “Jiaying.” He called when he rematerialized.

Jiaying glowered at Violet before retreating. Neither Emma’s, nor her own powers had worked on the woman before her. Time to retreat and reassess. She broke away from the tip of the blade and collecting the blonde woman who had spent the confrontation on the peripheries, retreated to Gordon. The three joined hands and with another light show, were gone…

“We were out of Bahrain within, like, 2 hours? I think.” Skye broke off the story. She sipped from her mug, only the find it long empty.

Outside the cockpit window the stars had made significant progress on their nightly journey, she hadn’t realised she had been talking for so long.

“You said you killed Eva, but she wasn’t dead when Gordon took her.” May broke the uneasy silence that had fallen while Skye had been contemplating the stars.

Skye bit her lip, the cluster fuck that had been Bahrain wasn’t the last time they had run into Jiaying and her group, but she was in no way ready to share _that_ particular story with someone who was virtually a stranger. It was something she even had trouble talking about with Violet and James and they had both been there.

“We ran into them again.” Skye bit out. The silent ‘I’m not gonna talk about it’ coming cross loud and clear.

May nodded, she understood not wanting to relive things. They each went back to their own thoughts, Skye watching the stars and May endlessly turning the mug in her hands, staring into its emptiness.


End file.
